He has a great team on his side, a huge talent and one of the best swings. If he keeps it up, I have no doubt he has the potential to be the number one player in the world. That’s what the legendary Gary Player said about Rory McIlroy four years ago, and it didn’t take long for his prediction to come true. The 23-year-old Northern Irishman, who had a spectacular 2012, has taken the golfing world by storm… although Tiger is lurking.
Not only did he win his second major (US PGA) and four other titles in 2012, but he also finished the season as number one in the world and on the European and American circuits. And on top of that, he broke the record for earnings in a year, previously held by Tiger Woods (in 2007, with 10,867,052 dollars), having pocketed 11,953,486 dollars (more than nine million euros) in prize money alone. A small pinch compared to the succulent contract he has signed with Nike for a period of ten years and a value of more than 200 million dollars.
Life, it is clear, is smiling on the young Rory, who already in 2011 had a spectacular season, with his first and resounding victory in a major, the U.S. Open, where he exhibited a game that had not been seen for many years in the Grand Slam and which resulted in several records.
The almost beardless boy with curly hair born in the Northern Irish village of Holywood became, at 22 years and 46 days, the youngest US Open winner since the legendary Bobby Jones in 1923 and the youngest on the European Tour since it was created. McIlroy beat the record of Seve Ballesteros, who won the British Open at 22 years and 103 days. Rory came close to reaching the all-time major record of 19 under par set by Woods at the 2000 British Open at St. Andrews.
His feat at the Congressional Country Club, in Maryland, was seasoned with some heart-stopping records, as he not only won by eight strokes ahead of the second, the Australian Jason Day, but also won with no less than 16 strokes under par, a tournament record.
Nobody was surprised then by his first Grand Slam victory – his victory in a Grand Slam had been predicted for some time – although nobody expected it to be by such a large lead and such a crushing score.
With the score of 268, 16 under par, Macllroy broke a U.S. Open record set by Tiger Woods, who won with -12 at Pebble Beach in 2000. He also became the third player to shoot all four rounds under 70 strokes in the tournament.
Even Woods himself, who missed the tournament due to injury and has not won a major since the 2008 U.S. Open, acknowledged that Rory’s was “an impressive performance.”
That at Congressional Country Club was Rory’s second victory on the American Tour, where in 2010 he won the Wells Fargo Championship with a record-breaking final round of 62 to beat Phil Mickelson by four strokes. In 2011, he also finished tied third in the US PGA and the British Open. With 63 strokes, he recorded the lowest first round at St Andrews in the tournament’s history. He became the second 20-year-old player to break into the top ten in the world, after Sergio Garcia.
FROM MAGNIFICENT TO EXCEPTIONAL
But if the 2011 season was magnificent, the 2012 season was exceptional. Apart from his role in the spectacular European victory in the Ryder Cup, Rory scored his first victory of the year in March at The Honda Classic, on the American Tour, after finishing second in February at the Accenture World Match Play Championship. In his third U.S. appearance of the year, the Cadillac World Championship, he finished third. The Northern Irishman made it clear who dominated the pen. His second victory, after having passed the Masters and the British Open without glory and having missed the cut at the US Open, came in August with the US PGA Championship, his second major. September was his most profitable month in terms of earnings, as he scored victories in the Deutsche Bank Championship and the BMW Championship, each with 1,440,000 dollars for the winner, the same as the US PGA Championship. His last victory of the season, at the end of November, was in the European Tour, when he won the Dubai World Cup. On the American and European circuits he scored in addition to his five victories (six with the Ryder Cup) another ten top-10s, including three second places and two third places. “I have fulfilled all my goals. I’ve won my second major and I’ve been part of a glorious Ryder. It’s been my best year. You can’t ask for more,” summed up McIlroy after winning in Dubai.
PRECOCIOUS AS TIGER
Like Tiger, at the age of 2 years Rory was already making a lot of noise with the clubs in his hands. No wonder he went on to have a brilliant amateur career in which he reached the top of the World Amateur Ranking and became the youngest winner of the prestigious West of Ireland and Irish Closed Championship in 2005. McIlroy had been one of the most solid youngsters in world-class golf for years. Not in vain, he had become in 2009 the youngest player in history to reach the top 50 of the world ranking. Born on May 4, 1989, McIlroy surpassed the previous record of Sergio Garcia, who entered the top 50 on August 15, 1999, after his head-to-head with Tiger Woods in the famous US PGA. The Northern Irishman entered the prestigious club of the top 50 at the age of 19 years and 202 days.
Rory played his first European Tour tournament in 2005, a few days after his 16th birthday and while still an amateur. Also with that status, he caused a sensation on his magnificent first day of the 2007 British Open when he signed 3 under par, the only bogey-free round, to finish the day in third place.
After a brilliant amateur career, which he crowned as world number one in the amateur rankings, he turned professional in the fall of 2007 after playing in the Walker Cup with the Great Britain and Ireland team against the United States.
He made the cut in his first professional tournament and finished third in his second event, the Alfred Dunhill Links Championship, earning enough money to secure a place in the top 115 of the European Tour rankings at the end of the season, making him the youngest and fastest player to secure a card for next season in just two tournaments.
In his third participation, in the Valle Romano Madrid Open, he finished fourth. It was clear that this boy was going to give a lot to talk about, in January 2008 he entered the top 200 of the world ranking. In 2009 he won his first victory in the European Tour, in the Dubai Desert Classic. It was clear that the boy was going to give a lot to talk about…. Now, in the season that has just begun, he has to prove that his results are not the result of chance, but of an exceptional quality. Behind him in the world ranking he has no more and no less than Tiger Woods himself, although at a considerable distance (more than four points). The spectacle, with these two beasts, is served.
9,216,350 euros Record earnings in a year, almost a million more than Woods in 2007 The end-of-season victory in Dubai not only cemented McIlroy’s world leadership, but also took him to a new record earnings in a single campaign, with 11,953,586 dollars (9,216,350 euros). The figure adds up the successes of this young world leader in tournaments on the most important circuits of the planet and surpasses by more than one million dollars the previous record, held by Tiger Woods since the 2007 campaign. That year, the American won official prize money worth 10,867,052 dollars (8,380,065 euros). McIlroy, in addition and in terms of the European Tour, set a historic record as he has become the player who has accumulated more euros in a single campaign, with 5,519,118 thanks to his aforementioned victory in the Dubai Final (1,041,429 euros) coupled with his victory in the ‘Race to Dubai’, which earned him an added prize of 1,822,520 euros. McIlroy also topped the 2012 US PGA Tour earnings list, with 8,047,952 dollars, although some of his tournaments (the Grand Slam and WGC Championships) also counted for the European circuit. The Englishman Luke Donald, second in the ranking, was the first golfer to officially win the winnings lists in the same year on both sides of the Atlantic, in 2011. McIlroy has surpassed Donald’s 2011 earnings (5,323,400 euros), as well as defeating him in the last 18 holes of the Dubai Final at the course of one of his main sponsors, Jumeirah States. Sergio García (twenty-first) and Gonzalo Fernández-Castaño (thirty-third) are the only Spaniards still in the top-50 of the world ranking.
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